Re: [asa] New at the Post-Darwinist: Fr. Coyne's star setting/purely "scientific" Darwinism?

I think we can learn an important lesson from Denyse's insistence on an
interpretation of ulterior motives in Coyne's retirement despite official
denials. I probably have as much if not more experience in corporate
politics than anyone on this list and have often been involved in decisions
which get "interpreted" later by employees and outside observers. It seems
inevitable that outsiders always attribute more motives and powers to
executive decisions than really exist. To be sure, there are often hidden
or ulterior motives in such decisions but for the vast majority of decisions
there are a complex set of factors that have to be weighed. One of them is
how a decision might be misinterpreted. The net is that outsiders almost
always get it wrong. They simply don't have the full set of information
available to the decision makers. What some observer may see as "sending a
message" may be only a small part of the total picture. In most cases where
a message is intended to be conveyed by an action, the decision makers make
sure that the intended recipients of that message get it loud and clear.

Usually the observers claim to "understand the underlying politics" and to
"have seen this sort of drama played out in other large organizations" and
sometimes they are right. But not usually.

The lesson is clear: unless a message is explicitly articulated together
with an action, any interpretation is simply speculation. If it agrees with
your biases, you'll believe it. If it doesn't, you won't. In either case,
you're probably wrong.

Randy

----- Original Message -----
From: "Denyse O'Leary" <oleary@sympatico.ca>
To: "'George Murphy'" <gmurphy@raex.com>; <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, August 29, 2006 3:44 AM
Subject: RE: [asa] New at the Post-Darwinist: Fr. Coyne's star
setting/purely "scientific" Darwinism?

> Hello, George and all:
>
> No, I did not miss any point. Picking that time to announce Coyne's
> retirement was as loud a message as one hears, about acceptable avenues of
> dissent.
>
> Yes, Coyne was sick and old, but one normally waits to announce a
> retirement
> if one is not sending a message.
>
> A priest wrote yesterday to say that I sounded like an experienced
> Vaticanologist. Actually, I know little about the Vatican, but I have seen
> this sort of drama played out in other large organizations.
>
> My sympathies, here as always, are entirely with the dump-ee, but I
> understand the underlying politics.
>
> You and other ASA-ers can believe whatever you wish, of course.
>
> Cheers, Denyse
>
>
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Received on Tue Aug 29 20:52:26 2006